No. 13-1314
IN THE
Supreme Court of the United States
ARIZONA STATE LEGISLATURE,
Appellant,
v.
ARIZONA INDEPENDENT REDISTRICTING
COMMISSION, et al.,
Appellees.
On Appeal from the United States
District Court for the District of Arizona
BRIEF OF THE CAMPAIGN LEGAL CENTER,
THE LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS OF THE
UNITED STATES, THE AMERICAN CIVIL
LIBERTIES UNION, COMMON CAUSE, AND
DEMOCRACY 21 AS AMICI CURIAE IN
SUPPORT OF APPELLEES
J. GERALD HEBERT
THE CAMPAIGN LEGAL
CENTER, INC.
215 E Street, NE
Washington, DC 20002
PAUL M. SMITH
Counsel of Record
JESSICA RING AMUNSON
MICHELLE R. SINGER
JENNER & BLOCK LLP
1099 New York Ave., NW
Suite 900
Washington, DC 20001
(202) 639-6000
psmith@jenner.com
Counsel for Amici Curiae
Additional Counsel Listed on Inside Cover
SEAN J. YOUNG
STEVEN R. SHAPIRO
MATTHEW COLES
DALE E. HO
JULIE EBENSTEIN
AMERICAN CIVIL
LIBERTIES UNION
FOUNDATION
125 Broad Street
New York, NY 10004
ARTHUR N. EISENBERG
NEW YORK CIVIL
LIBERTIES UNION
125 Broad Street
New York, NY 10004
LLOYD LEONARD
THE LEAGUE OF WOMEN
VOTERS OF THE UNITED
STATES
1730 M Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036
TABLE OF CONTENTS
TABLE OF AUTHORITIES .......................................... iii
INTERESTS OF AMICI CURIAE ................................ 1
SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT ......................................... 3
ARGUMENT ....................................................................... 5
I.
II.
Partisan Gerrymandering Poses A Threat
To Our Democracy. ................................................. 5
A.
The Court In Vieth v. Jubelirer
Unanimously
Agreed
That
Extreme
Partisan
Gerrymandering Is Unconstitutional
And Harmful. ............................................... 6
B.
Partisan Gerrymandering Thwarts
Majority Rule, Makes Elections
Less Competitive, And Heightens
Political Polarization, Thereby
Undermining Democratic Accountability............................................................. 8
Without Judicial Recourse, Partisan
Gerrymandering Can Be Prevented By
Allowing The People To Exercise Their
Lawmaking
Power
Over
The
Redistricting Process............................................ 17
A.
Until The Court Provides A
Standard For Judicial Restraint Of
Extreme
Partisan
Gerrymandering, Lower Courts Will Be
Unable To Curb It. .................................... 17
ii
B.
Partisan Gerrymandering Can Be
Curtailed By Allowing Citizens To
Exercise Their Sovereign Power
Over The Redistricting Process. ............. 21
CONCLUSION ................................................................. 29
iii
TABLE OF AUTHORITIES
CASES
Alabama Legislative Black Caucus v.
Alabama, 988 F. Supp. 2d 1285 (M.D. Ala.
2013) .......................................................................... 19
Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Arizona,
Inc., 133 S. Ct. 2247 (2013)..................................... 26
Baldus v. Members of the Wisconsin
Government Accountability Board, 849 F.
Supp. 2d 840 (E.D. Wis. 2012) .......................... 19-20
Benisek v. Mack, 11 F. Supp. 3d 516 (D. Md.),
summarily aff’d, 584 F. App’x 140 (4th
Cir. 2014) .................................................................. 19
Brown v. Secretary of Florida, 668 F.3d 1271
(11th Cir. 2012) ........................................................ 28
Committee for a Fair & Balanced Map v.
Illinois State Board of Elections, 835 F.
Supp. 2d 563 (N.D. Ill. 2011) .................................. 20
Davis v. Bandemer, 478 U.S. 109 (1986)...................... 6
Fletcher v. Lamone, 831 F. Supp. 2d 887 (D.
Md. 2011), summarily aff’d, 133 S. Ct. 29
(2012) ........................................................................ 20
Henderson v. Perry, 399 F. Supp. 2d 756 (E.D.
Tex. 2005) ................................................................. 20
Hollingsworth v. Perry, 133 S. Ct. 2652 (2013) ........ 25
Larios v. Cox, 300 F. Supp. 2d 1320 (N.D. Ga.
2004), summarily aff’d, 542 U.S. 947 (2004) ....... 18
iv
League of United Latin American Citizens v.
Perry, 548 U.S. 399 (2006) ..................................... 18
League of Women Voters v. Quinn, No. 11-cv5569, 2011 WL 5143044 (N.D. Ill. Oct. 28,
2011), summarily aff’d, 132 S. Ct. 2430
(2012) ........................................................................ 20
McCutcheon v. FEC, 134 S. Ct. 1434 (2014) ............. 22
NLRB v. Canning, 134 S. Ct. 2550 (2014) ................. 25
Pearson v. Koster, 359 S.W.3d 35 (Mo. 2012)............ 20
Perez v. Perry, 26 F. Supp. 3d 612 (W.D. Tex.
2014) .......................................................................... 19
Perez v. Texas, No. 11-CA-360, 2011 WL
9160142 (W.D. Tex. Sept. 2, 2011) ........................ 20
Powell v. McCormack, 395 U.S. 486 (1969) .............. 22
Radogno v. Illinois State Board of Elections,
No. 11-cv-04884, 2011 WL 5025251 (N.D.
Ill. Oct. 21, 2011)................................................ 19, 20
Radogno v. Illinois State Board of Elections,
No. 11-cv-04884, 2011 WL 5868225 (N.D.
Ill. Nov. 22, 2011), summarily aff’d, 133 S.
Ct. 103 (2012) ..................................................... 19, 20
Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533 (1964) ......................... 3
Schuette v. Coalition To Defend Affirmative
Action, 134 S. Ct. 1623 (2014).......................... 25, 27
Ex parte Siebold, 100 U.S. 371 (1879) ........................ 26
State ex rel. Cooper v. Tennant, 730 S.E.2d
238 (W. Va. 2012) .................................................... 20
v
United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549 (1995) .............. 27
Vieth
v.
Jubelirer,
541
U.S.
267
(2004) .................................................. 5, 6, 7, 8, 18, 24
CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISIONS AND STATUTES
U.S. Const. pmbl. .......................................................... 21
U.S. Const. art. I, § 2 ................................................ 4, 22
U.S. Const. art. I, § 2, cl. 3 ........................................... 21
U.S. Const. art. 1, § 2, cl. 4 ........................................... 21
U.S. Const. art. IV, § 4 ................................................. 21
2 U.S.C. § 2a(c) .............................................................. 26
2 U.S.C. § 2a(c)(1)-(5) ................................................... 26
Ariz. Const. art. IV, part 1, § 1 ................................... 27
OTHER AUTHORITIES
Alan I. Abramowitz et al., Incumbency,
Redistricting, and the Decline of
Competition in U.S. House Elections, 68 J.
Pol. 75 (2006) ............................................................ 13
Mitchell
N.
Berman,
Managing
Gerrymandering, 83 Tex. L. Rev. 781
(2005) .......................................................................... 6
Stephen Breyer, Active Liberty (2005) ...................... 24
Jay S. Bybee, Ulysses at the Mast:
Democracy, Federalism, and the Sirens’
Song of the Seventeenth Amendment, 91
Nw. U. L. Rev. 500 (1997) ..................................... 23
vi
Bruce E. Cain, Redistricting Commissions: A
Better Political Buffer?, 121 Yale L.J.
1808 (2012) ............................................................... 28
Jamie L. Carson et al., Redistricting and
Party Polarization in the U.S. House of
Representatives, 35 Am. Pol. Res. 878
(2007) ........................................................................ 14
Jowei
Chen
&
Jonathan
Rodden,
Unintentional Gerrymandering: Political
Geography and Electoral Bias in
Legislatures, 8 Q.J. Pol. Sci. 239 (2013) ............... 12
The Declaration of Independence para. 2 (U.S.
1776) .......................................................................... 21
John Hart Ely, Democracy and Distrust 87
(1980) .................................................................. 21, 25
Heather K. Evans et al., The Enduring
Effects Of Competitive Elections, 24 J.
Elec. Pub. Op. & Parties 455 (2014) ..................... 15
Fair Vote, Ctr. For Voting & Democracy,
Redistricting
2012:
The
Worst
Congressional Map Ever? (Oct. 2012)................. 13
The Federalist No. 52 (James Madison)
(Clinton Rossiter ed., 1961) ................................... 23
The Federalist No. 53 (James Madison)
(Clinton Rossiter ed., 1961) ................................... 23
The Federalist No. 57 (James Madison)
(Clinton Rossiter ed., 1961) ................................... 23
The Federalist No. 63 (James Madison)
(Clinton Rossiter ed., 1961) ............................. 16, 23
vii
Sam Hirsch, The United States House of
Unrepresentatives: What Went Wrong in
the Latest Round of Congressional
Redistricting, 2 Election L.J. 179 (2003) ............. 11
Samuel Issacharoff, Gerrymandering and
Political Cartels, 116 Harv. L. Rev. 593
(2002) .................................................................. 12, 16
Sundeep Iyer, Brennan Ctr. for Justice,
Redistricting and Congressional Control
Following the 2012 Election (Nov. 28,
2012),
http://www.brennancenter.org/
analysis/redistricting-and-congressionalcontrol-following-2012-election ............................. 10
Justin Levitt, Who Draws The Lines?, All
About Redistricting, Loyola Law School,
http://redistricting.lls.edu/who.php
(last
visited Jan. 11, 2015)............................................... 28
Nolan McCarty et al., Does Gerrymandering
Cause Polarization?, 53 Am. J. Pol. Sci.
666 (2009) ........................................................... 12, 13
Michael W. McConnell, The Redistricting
Cases: Original Mistakes and Current
Consequences, 24 Harv. J.L. & Pub. Pol’y
103 (2000) ................................................................... 9
Note, Judicial Approaches to Direct
Democracy, 118 Harv. L. Rev. 2748 (2005) ......... 27
David G. Oedel et al., Does the Introduction of
Independent
Redistricting
Reduce
Congressional Partisanship?, 54 Vill. L.
Rev. 57 (2006) .......................................................... 15
viii
Daniel R. Ortiz, Got Theory?, 153 U. Pa. L.
Rev. 459 (2004) ........................................................ 12
Griff Palmer & Michael Cooper, How Maps
Helped Republicans Keep an Edge in the
House, N.Y. Times, Dec. 14, 2012,
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/15/us/poli
tics/redistricting-helped-republicans-holdonto-congress.html ........................................... 10, 11
Richard H. Pildes, The Constitution and
Political Competition, 30 Nova L. Rev.
253 (2006) ................................................................. 11
Richard H. Pildes, The Constitutionalization
of Democratic Politics, 118 Harv. L. Rev.
28 (2004) ................................................................... 13
Richard
H.
Pildes,
Romanticizing
Democracy, Political Fragmentation, and
the Decline of American Government, 124
Yale L.J. 804 (2014) ................................................ 14
Richard H. Pildes, Why The Center Does Not
Hold: The Causes Of Hyperpolarized
Democracy In America, 99 Calif. L. Rev.
273 (2011) ................................................................. 15
Christopher J. Roederer, The Noble Business
of “Incumbantocracy:” A Response to the
Sordid Business of Democracy, 34 Ohio
N.U. L. Rev. 373 (2008)............................................ 9
Nicholas O. Stephanopoulos, Elections and
Alignment, 114 Colum. L. Rev. 283
(2014) .............................................................. 9, 10, 12
ix
Nicholas O. Stephanopoulos & Eric M.
McGhee, Partisan Gerrymandering and
the Efficiency Gap (Univ. of Chi., Public
Law and Legal Theory Working Paper
No. 493, 2014), http://papers.ssrn.com/
sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2457468 (82
U. Chi. L. Rev. (forthcoming 2015)) ....................... 5
G.
Alan Tarr & Robert F. Williams,
Eighteenth Annual Issue on State
Constitutional Law:
Introduction, 37
Rutgers L.J. 877 (2006) ...................................... 9, 16
Jeffrey Toobin, The Great Election Grab, New
Yorker (Dec. 8, 2003) .............................................. 14
David Wasserman, Why House Republicans
Did Even Better Than They Expected,
FiveThirtyEight (Nov. 18, 2014, 11:50
AM), http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/
why-house-republicans-did-even-betterthan-they-expected/ ............................................... 11
Alex J. Whitman, Pinpoint Redistricting and
the
Minimization
of
Partisan
Gerrymandering, 59 Emory L.J. 211
(2009) ........................................................................ 13
1
INTERESTS OF AMICI CURIAE
1
Amicus curiae The Campaign Legal Center, Inc.
(CLC) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that
works in the area of election law, generally, and voting
rights law, specifically, generating public policy
proposals and participating in state and federal court
litigation throughout the nation regarding voting
rights. The CLC has served as amicus curiae or
counsel in voting rights and redistricting cases in this
Court, including Shelby County v. Holder, 133 S. Ct.
2612 (2013), Bartlett v. Strickland, 556 U.S. 1 (2009),
and Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, 553
U.S. 181 (2008), among others. The CLC has a
demonstrated interest in voting rights and redistricting
law.
Amicus curiae the League of Women Voters of the
United States (the League) is a nonpartisan,
community-based organization that encourages the
informed and active participation of citizens in
government and influences public policy through
education and advocacy. Founded in 1920 as an
outgrowth of the struggle to win voting rights for
women, the League is organized in close to 800
communities and in every state, with more than 150,000
members and supporters nationwide. The League
1
Pursuant to Rule 37.6, amici affirm that no counsel for a party
authored this brief in whole or in part and that no person other
than amici and their counsel made a monetary contribution to its
preparation or submission. The parties’ letters of consent to the
filing of amicus briefs are on file with the Clerk’s office.
2
promotes an open governmental system that is
representative, accountable, and responsive and that
ensures opportunities for citizen participation in
government decision-making. To further this goal, the
League has been a leader in seeking reform of the
redistricting process at the state, local, and federal
levels for more than three decades.
Amicus curiae the American Civil Liberties Union
Foundation (ACLU) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan
organization with 500,000 members dedicated to the
principles of liberty and equality enshrined in the
Constitution and our nation’s civil rights laws. In
support of those principles, the ACLU has appeared
before this Court in numerous cases involving electoral
democracy, including earlier cases addressing the issue
of excessive partisan gerrymandering.
Amicus curiae Common Cause is a nonpartisan,
nonprofit citizens’ organization dedicated to ensuring
open, accountable, and effective government. Common
Cause works to strengthen public participation in the
political process and to ensure that process serves the
public interest. To that end, Common Cause has
pursued redistricting reform for several decades in
states including Arizona, California, Colorado,
Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana,
Iowa, Maryland, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Mexico,
New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon,
Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas, Washington,
Wisconsin, Utah, and others. Specifically, Common
Cause led the coalition that successfully pushed for the
ballot initiative creating the Arizona Independent
Redistricting Commission. Common Cause was also a
3
sponsor of two successful ballot initiatives to amend the
Florida
Constitution
to
prohibit
partisan
gerrymandering. Common Cause led efforts to reform
California’s redistricting process by drafting, serving as
a proponent of, and defending Proposition 11, which
created the Citizens Redistricting Commission, and
Proposition 20, which expanded the Commission’s
responsibility to draw congressional districts.
Amicus curiae Democracy 21 is a nonprofit,
nonpartisan policy organization that works to
strengthen democracy. Democracy 21 has participated
as counsel or amicus curiae in a number of cases before
this Court involving the constitutionality of the
campaign finance laws and other reform laws. The
organization works to ensure the integrity of
government decisions and to provide for fair and honest
elections. It supports campaign finance and other
political reforms, conducts public education efforts to
accomplish these goals, participates in litigation
involving the constitutionality and interpretation of
campaign finance and other political reform laws, and
engages in efforts to help ensure that these laws are
properly interpreted and enforced.
SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT
It has been just over fifty years since this Court
first remarked that the goal of redistricting is to
establish “fair and effective representation for all
citizens.” Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U.S. 533, 565-68
(1964). Today, however, many state legislators appear
to operate on the assumption that the goal of
redistricting is to gain maximum partisan advantage
for the political party that controls the redistricting
4
process.
Partisan gerrymandering has reached
unprecedented levels, subverting the federal electoral
system envisioned by the Constitution. The harms of
partisan gerrymandering have been well documented:
the practice undermines the concept of majority rule,
reduces the competitiveness of elections, and
contributes to the political polarization that feeds
gridlock.
Despite these harms, a practicable standard for
adjudicating partisan gerrymandering claims has
remained elusive, and the judiciary has thus far been
unable to rein in this practice. As a result, other
solutions are currently being explored by citizens
seeking to enforce the guarantee in Article I, Section 2
of the Constitution that their Members of Congress
actually be “chosen . . . by the People of the several
States,” U.S. Const. art. I, § 2, rather than
predetermined through gerrymandering by state
legislatures.
Most prominently, voters in several
states, including Arizona, have used the initiative
process to require redistricting by independent
commissions so as to avoid partisan influence and
incumbency protection.
These independent redistricting commissions are a
valuable result of direct democracy, which allows the
people of an individual state to avail themselves of their
inherent lawmaking power and bypass self-interested
politicians in order to secure the fair elections to which
they are constitutionally entitled.
Citizen-driven
structural reforms such as Arizona’s independent
redistricting commission are one of the few remaining
alternatives for addressing partisan gerrymandering
5
given that courts have, to this point, been unable to
fashion a judicially manageable standard to curb
gerrymandering, and that congressional action is highly
unlikely.
A reading of the Elections Clause that would
preclude the “People of the several States” from
reining in the unconstitutional practice of extreme
partisan gerrymandering in elections for the House of
Representatives would be fundamentally inconsistent
with the Constitution’s commitment to a system of
government for “We the People of the United States.”
Amici therefore respectfully urge the Court to uphold
the decision of the district court finding that the
Elections Clause does not preclude redistricting by an
independent commission created by the People of
Arizona.
ARGUMENT
I.
Partisan Gerrymandering Poses A Threat To
Our Democracy.
In Vieth v. Jubelirer, 541 U.S. 267 (2004), this Court
made clear that it believes extreme partisan
gerrymandering is a significant problem that amounts
to disruption of our constitutional order. The problem
has only worsened in the decade since Vieth. Indeed,
“the problem of gerrymandering has never been worse
2
in modern American history.” As the problem of
2
Nicholas O. Stephanopoulos & Eric M. McGhee, Partisan
Gerrymandering and the Efficiency Gap 5, (Univ. of Chi. Public
Law and Legal Theory Working Paper No. 493, 2014),
6
gerrymandering worsens, its distortive effect on our
electoral
system
grows.
Severe
partisan
gerrymandering has been shown to undermine
representative democracy, reduce the competitiveness
of elections, and contribute to political polarization.
A. The Court In Vieth v. Jubelirer Unanimously
Agreed
That
Extreme
Partisan
Gerrymandering Is Unconstitutional And
Harmful.
Judicial involvement with partisan gerrymandering
claims began nearly thirty years ago with the case of
Davis v. Bandemer, 478 U.S. 109 (1986), in which this
Court held that partisan gerrymandering presents a
justiciable case or controversy. Id. at 143. Eighteen
years later, the Court revisited the issue in Vieth v.
Jubelirer, 541 U.S. 267 (2004). While the Court in Vieth
disagreed
on
the
justiciability
of
partisan
gerrymandering claims, the Court was unanimous in
agreeing that “excessive partisanship in redistricting is
3
unconstitutional.”
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2457468 (82 U.
Chi. L. Rev. (forthcoming 2015)).
3
Mitchell N. Berman, Managing Gerrymandering, 83 Tex. L. Rev.
781, 782 (2005) (“To be sure, Vieth did advance the ball in one
critical respect: For the first time, all nine Justices agreed that
excessive partisanship in redistricting is unconstitutional.”); see
Vieth, 541 U.S. at 292 (plurality opinion) (“We do not disagree with
[the] judgment” that “severe partisan gerrymanders [are
incompatible] with democratic principles”); id. at 314-17 (Kennedy
J., concurring) (concluding that partisan gerrymandering raises
First Amendment concerns); id. at 317-18 (Stevens, J., dissenting)
7
The Court was likewise unanimous in agreeing that
extreme partisan gerrymandering is harmful to
American democracy. The four justices in the plurality
acknowledged, for example, that excessive partisanship
in redistricting offends the Constitution—and is
therefore “unlawful”—and also that the “excessive
injection of politics” into the redistricting process is
fundamentally
“[incompatible]
with
democratic
principles.”
Vieth, 541 U.S. at 292-93.
In his
concurrence, Justice Kennedy noted that “[a]llegations
of unconstitutional bias in apportionment are most
serious claims,” explaining that severe partisan
gerrymanders impose burdens “on the representational
rights of voters and parties.” Id. at 311-13 (Kennedy,
J., concurring).
Justice Kennedy applauded the
plurality
for
acknowledging
that
“partisan
gerrymandering that disfavors one party” is
impermissible. Id. at 316; see also id. (giving examples
of both an “egregious” and a “more subtle” partisan
gerrymander, and concluding that “each is culpable”).
He further lamented that “[w]hether spoken with
concern or pride, it is unfortunate that our legislators
have reached the point of declaring that, when it comes
(“The concept of equal justice under law requires the State to
govern impartially[, and] partisan gerrymanders that are devoid of
any rational justification . . . cannot be said to [be] impartial[].”); id.
at 343 (Souter, J., dissenting) (explaining that “the guarantee of
equal protection condemns [some forms of partisan
gerrymandering] as a denial of substantial equality”); id. at 355
(Breyer, J., dissenting) (“The use of purely political considerations
in drawing district boundaries is not a ‘necessary evil’ that . . . the
Constitution inevitably must tolerate.”).
8
to apportionment: ‘We are in the business of rigging
elections.’” Id. at 317 (citation omitted).
The various dissenters in Vieth similarly expressed
concern with the harms of partisan gerrymandering.
Justice Stevens’ dissent observed that the “danger of a
partisan gerrymander is that the representative will
perceive that the people who put her in power are
those who drew the map rather than those who cast
ballots, and she will feel beholden not to a subset of her
constituency, but to no part of her constituency at all.”
Id. at 331 (Stevens, J., dissenting). Justice Souter,
joined by Justice Ginsburg, asserted that “the
increasing efficiency of partisan redistricting has
damaged the democratic process to a degree that our
predecessors only began to imagine.” Id. at 345
(Souter, J., dissenting). Similarly, Justice Breyer’s
dissent
recognized
that
“purely
political
‘gerrymandering’ . . . threaten[s] serious democratic
harm” and “violates basic democratic norms.” Id. at
355, 361 (Breyer, J., dissenting). Thus, the Vieth Court
expressed deep concern about partisan excesses in
redistricting, both as a matter of constitutional law and
with respect to the vitality of American democracy.
B. Partisan Gerrymandering Thwarts Majority
Rule, Makes Elections Less Competitive, And
Heightens Political Polarization, Thereby
Undermining Democratic Accountability.
The Vieth Court’s unanimous recognition of
gerrymandering’s
subversion
of
fundamental
democratic values rests upon a sound empirical basis.
As the scholarly literature emphasizes, “the
quintessential injury inflicted by gerrymandering” is
9
that gerrymandered district configurations often fail to
reflect the actual partisan divide within the electorate,
resulting in legislatures whose composition diverges
4
from the will of a majority of voters. This practice
“undermine[s] citizen participation and republican self
5
governance.”
Partisan gerrymandering’s interference with
majority rule is borne out in the statistics on partisan
bias—a measurement of “the divergence in the share of
seats that each party would win given the same share
6
of the statewide vote.” Scholars have determined that
when a party is in full control of a state’s government,
the redistricting plans it enacts “tend to award it about
6% more seats than if the opposing party had been
4
Nicholas O. Stephanopoulos, Elections and Alignment, 114
Colum. L. Rev. 283, 286 (2014) (noting that “the most glaring
problem with gerrymandering . . . is the partisan havoc that it may
wreak”); see also G. Alan Tarr & Robert F. Williams, Eighteenth
Annual Issue on State Constitutional Law: Introduction, 37
Rutgers L.J. 877, 878 (2006) (“Partisan gerrymandering ensures
that the make-up of legislatures will fail to reflect fairly the
partisan division within the electorate.”); Michael W. McConnell,
The Redistricting Cases: Original Mistakes and Current
Consequences, 24 Harv. J.L. & Pub. Pol’y 103, 116 (2000)
(“Partisan gerrymandering is designed to entrench a particular
political faction against effective political challenge—sometimes
even to give a political minority effective control. That is in
obvious tension with the values of Republicanism.”).
5
Christopher J. Roederer, The Noble Business of
“Incumbantocracy:” A Response to the Sordid Business of
Democracy, 34 Ohio N.U. L. Rev. 373, 389 (2008).
6
Stephanopoulos, Elections and Alignment, supra note 4, at 347.
10
7
responsible for redistricting.” And one recent analysis
showed that “the typical 2012 congressional plan
featured an absolute bias of about 11%,” the highest
score since 1966.8
Both parties have engaged in this undemocratic
practice. A study by the Brennan Center for Justice
showed that in 2012, in states where Republicans
controlled the redistricting process, their candidates
won roughly 53 percent of the vote but 72 percent of
9
the seats. In states where Democrats controlled the
process, their candidates won about 56 percent of the
10
vote and 71 percent of the seats.
For example,
“Democratic Congressional candidates won nearly half
the votes in Virginia but only 27 percent of its seats,
and 48 percent of the vote in Ohio but only a quarter of
11
its seats.” Meanwhile, “[i]n Illinois, where Democrats
drew the maps, Republican Congressional candidates
won 45 percent of the popular vote but only a third of
7
8
Id. at 349.
Id. at 348.
9
Sundeep Iyer, Brennan Ctr. For Justice, Redistricting and
Congressional Control Following the 2012 Election (Nov. 28,
2012),
http://www.brennancenter.org/analysis/redistricting-andcongressional-control-following-2012-election.
10
11
Id.
Griff Palmer & Michael Cooper, How Maps Helped Republicans
Keep an Edge in the House, N.Y. Times, Dec. 14, 2012,
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/15/us/politics/redistrict
inghelped-republicans-hold-onto-congress.html.
11
the House seats. And in Maryland, Republicans won 35
12
percent of the votes but just 13 percent of the seats.”
Gerrymandering thus thwarts the will of voting
majorities, “arrest[ing] the House’s dynamic process”
and “creat[ing] undemocratic slippage between the
13
people and their government.” In this way, partisan
gerrymandering is turning the House “into something
14
sclerotic and skewed,” rather than an institution
responsive to and aligned with the actual preferences of
15
the voters.
Partisan gerrymandering likewise thwarts the will
of the majority by reducing electoral competitiveness.
Indeed, the entire strategy of gerrymandering is “to
12
Id.
13
Richard H. Pildes, The Constitution and Political Competition,
30 Nova L. Rev. 253, 260-61 (2006).
14
Sam Hirsch, The United States House of Unrepresentatives:
What Went Wrong in the Latest Round of Congressional
Redistricting, 2 Election L.J. 179, 215 (2003).
15
In 2014, Republicans won 52 percent of the popular vote, but
captured 57 percent of the seats in the House. David Wasserman,
FiveThirtyEight, Why House Republicans Did Even Better Than
They
Expected
(Nov.
18,
2014,
11:50
AM),
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-house-republicans-dideven-better-than-they-expected/. In 2012, Republicans won 48
percent of the popular vote, but captured 55 percent of the seats in
the House, making 2012 “one of a handful of elections in the last
century where the party that won the popular vote for Congress
did not win control of the House.” Palmer & Cooper, supra note
11.
12
16
make virtually every district noncompetitive.” The
decline in competitive districts results in significant
part from the practice of “packing,” in which selfinterested politicians draw districts filled with
sympathetic voters, creating safe districts dominated
by voters loyal to one party’s candidates. Often,
incumbents excise competitors and divide up the
constituencies of those competitors. To be sure, the
rise in safe seats can also be attributed partly to the
17
geographic distribution of the parties’ supporters.
But it is one thing for elections to become less
competitive due solely to natural geographic selfsorting, and entirely another for legislators to
16
Daniel R. Ortiz, Got Theory?, 153 U. Pa. L. Rev. 459, 483 (2004)
(noting that the “strategy [of gerrymandering] . . . aims to make
virtually every district noncompetitive”); see also Stephanopoulos,
Elections and Alignment, supra note 4, at 343-44 (noting that a
“key harm” of gerrymandering “is the lack of competition that
ensues when incumbents are placed in overly safe districts”);
Samuel Issacharoff, Gerrymandering and Political Cartels, 116
Harv. L. Rev. 593, 600 (2002) (defining gerrymandering as “[a]
constriction of the competitive processes by which voters can
express choice”).
17
See Jowei Chen & Jonathan Rodden, Unintentional
Gerrymandering: Political Geography and Electoral Bias in
Legislatures, 8 Q.J. Pol. Sci. 239, 240 (2013) (referencing
“unintentional gerrymandering, whereby one party’s voters are
more geographically clustered than those of the opposing party
due to residential patterns and human geography.”); Nolan
McCarty et al., Does Gerrymandering Cause Polarization?, 53
Am. J. Pol. Sci. 666, 678 (2009) (pointing to “increased geographical
sorting on political and social attitudes”).
13
purposefully make elections less competitive for
themselves.
Overall, competitiveness in House elections has
18
One
been steadily declining since World War II.
recent study found that partisan gerrymandering
accounts for much of that decline, concluding that the
1980, 1990, and 2000 redistricting cycles accounted in
the aggregate for 83% of the decline in competitive
19
House seats since 1980.
This lack of competition
contrasts greatly with non-gerrymandered Senate and
gubernatorial races. For example, while fewer than
10% of House elections were competitive in 2002,
nearly 50% of Senate and gubernatorial elections were
20
competitive. And this trend has continued; a recent
study demonstrated that after the 2010 redistricting
cycle, there were 15 fewer competitive districts than
21
there were following the 2000 redistricting cycle.
Thus, “[o]ver the past decade, partisan gerrymandering
22
has made competitive legislative elections a rarity.”
18
See Alan I. Abramowitz et al., Incumbency, Redistricting, and
the Decline of Competition in U.S. House Elections, 68 J. Pol. 75,
75-76 (2006).
19
McCarty, supra note 17, at 673.
20
Richard H. Pildes, The Constitutionalization of Democratic
Politics, 118 Harv. L. Rev. 28, 63-64 (2004).
21
Fair Vote, Ctr. for Voting & Democracy, Redistricting 2012:
The Worst Congressional Map Ever? (Oct. 2012).
22
Alex J. Whitman, Pinpoint Redistricting and the Minimization
of Partisan Gerrymandering, 59 Emory L.J. 211, 212 (2009).
14
The increase in noncompetitive elections has had
ramifications beyond simply the constriction of voter
choice. First, the lack of competition contributes to the
unrepresentative “hyperpolarized political parties” that
23
have emerged in recent years.
Indeed, at least “a
portion of the polarization we are observing in
Congress is being artificially generated by the
mapmakers responsible for drawing district boundaries
24
at the state level.”
Second, the overwhelmingly safe seats created by
partisan
gerrymandering
encourage
ideological
candidates who listen only to the voices of the party’s
base, especially when primary elections all but decide
25
the ultimate winner. Safe seats artificially entrench
incumbents and can skew their positions, making them
unresponsive to the political center because their
electoral prospects do not depend on support from
26
centrist voters or members of the opposing party. In
23
Richard H. Pildes, Romanticizing Democracy, Political
Fragmentation, and the Decline of American Government, 124
Yale L.J. 804, 818 (2014).
24
Jamie L. Carson et al., Redistricting and Party Polarization in
the U.S. House of Representatives, 35 Am. Pol. Res. 878, 899 (2007)
(finding evidence that “districts that have undergone significant
change following redistricting have become more polarized, thus
contributing to higher levels of polarization among legislators
representing those districts”).
25
See Jeffrey Toobin, The Great Election Grab, New Yorker, at 63
(Dec. 8, 2003) (quoting Samuel Issacharoff).
26
See id.
15
those ways, partisan gerrymandering can encourage
extreme partisanship and discourage deliberative
compromise with members of opposing political parties,
producing policy gridlock that impedes the effective
functioning of Congress.27
Third, the decline in competitive elections has also
led to an increase in voter apathy and a concomitant
decline in voter participation. A key part of the success
of a democracy is the widespread belief in the fairness
of elections. Competitive elections have been found to
“have positive effects that endure for at least a year
beyond the campaign season, reinforcing the idea that
political competition plays a robust role in American
28
representative democracy.”
But this pattern of
representatives choosing their voters rather than
voters choosing their representatives reduces voters’
faith in government, creating public disaffection that
27
See David G. Oedel et al., Does the Introduction of Independent
Redistricting Reduce Congressional Partisanship?, 54 Vill. L.
Rev. 57, 57-58 (2006) (explaining that “partisanship may now pose
serious problems for the effective functioning of basic American
political institutions such as Congress”). However, not all scholars
agree that partisan gerrymandering has increased political
polarization. See, e.g., Richard H. Pildes, Why The Center Does
Not Hold: The Causes Of Hyperpolarized Democracy In America,
99 Calif. L. Rev. 273, 315 (2011) (concluding that, while “[t]here is
no doubt polarization has increased dramatically since the 1970s,
and that districted elections are
less competitive,”
gerrymandering “does not seem to be a major cause”).
28
Heather K. Evans et al., The Enduring Effects Of Competitive
Elections, 24 J. Elec. Pub. Op. & Parties 455, 455 (2014).
16
“can discourage potential voters and reduce political
29
participation.”
In these ways, extreme partisan gerrymandering
threatens “the prime guarantor of democratic
30
legitimacy”: accountability to the electorate.
The
House of Representatives was meant to be a
“numerous and changeable body” whose membership
would reflect the shifting popular will. See The
Federalist No. 63, at 383 (James Madison) (Clinton
Rossiter ed., 1961). Elected officials remain faithful to
voter preferences and responsive to shifts in those
preferences so long as they are held accountable by the
voters at election time. But partisan gerrymandering
“skews the incentive structures operating to ensure the
accountability of elected representatives to shifts in the
31
preferences of the electorate.” As a result, democratic
legitimacy is compromised.
In sum, the democratic harms caused by partisan
gerrymandering, as recognized by the Vieth Court and
confirmed by the scholarly literature, undermine the
functioning of American democracy.
29
30
31
Tarr & Williams, supra note 4, at 878.
Issacharoff, Political Cartels, supra note 16, at 615.
Id. at 605-06.
17
II.
Without
Judicial
Recourse,
Partisan
Gerrymandering Can Be Prevented By
Allowing The People To Exercise Their
Lawmaking Power Over The Redistricting
Process.
As discussed above, legislators have continuously
and increasingly demonstrated their inability to resist
the temptation of partisan gerrymandering. Absent a
miraculous sea change in the exercise of political selfrestraint on behalf of our nation’s elected officials, then,
the problem of partisan gerrymandering can best be
ameliorated in one of two ways: through judicial
intervention or by rebalancing the legislative role in
redistricting. The first approach, which would require
judicial enforcement of partisan gerrymandering
claims, remains theoretical at this point due to the lack
of judicially manageable standards. Therefore, the
second approach, which has been adopted by the voters
of Arizona, is one of the best remaining alternatives.
To read the Elections Clause in a manner that would
preclude the “People of the several States” from
exercising their sovereign power to assert control over
their choice of congressional representatives would
flout the very structure of our constitutional system.
A. Until The Court Provides A Standard For
Judicial Restraint Of Extreme Partisan
Gerrymandering, Lower Courts Will Be
Unable To Curb It.
The judicial branch is presently unable to provide a
check on partisan gerrymandering due to this Court’s
difficulty in identifying a judicially manageable
standard to adjudicate such claims. The Court’s
18
inability to agree on such a standard in Vieth left lower
courts with little guidance on how to adjudicate the
claims that the Court declared justiciable. See Vieth,
541 U.S. at 307-08, 317 (Kennedy, J., concurring)
(noting that the Court had “no basis on which to define
clear, manageable, and politically neutral standards”
and rejecting the dissenters’ proposed standards).
When the issue next arose in League of United Latin
American Citizens v. Perry (LULAC), 548 U.S. 399
(2006), the Court did not revisit the conclusion that
partisan gerrymandering claims are justiciable, see id.
at 414 (opinion of the Court), but it again declined to
promulgate a standard for deciding them, see id. at 420
(opinion of Kennedy, J.) (concluding that “the absence
of any other workable test for judging partisan
gerrymanders” compelled the rejection of the claim).32
The Vieth and LULAC decisions “place district
courts in the untenable position of evaluating political
gerrymandering claims without any definitive
32
Judicial enforcement has thus far been limited to the
circumstance where gerrymandering is accomplished by
systematically overpopulating districts dominated by one party
and underpopulating districts dominated by the other, thereby
violating the equipopulation requirement of the Equal Protection
Clause. See Larios v. Cox, 300 F. Supp. 2d 1320, 1328-31, 1338,
1352 (N.D. Ga. 2004) (concluding that population deviations in a
state legislative apportionment plan were not supported by “any
legitimate, consistently-applied state interests,” but rather were
the result of regionalism and “an obviously purposeful attempt to
unseat as many [Republican incumbents] as possible” and striking
down the plan as violating the one-person, one-vote principle),
summarily aff’d, 542 U.S. 947 (2004).
19
standards.” Radogno v. Ill. State Bd. of Elections
(Radogno I), No. 11-cv-04884, 2011 WL 5025251, at *4
(N.D. Ill. Oct. 21, 2011). The absence of clear standards
to apply to these claims has made it extraordinarily
difficult for lower courts to prevent states from
pursuing excessive partisanship in redistricting.
Indeed, in the decade that has passed since Vieth, lower
courts have repeatedly been put in the position of
asking: “How much [partisanship] is too much, and
why?” Radogno v. Ill. State Bd. of Elections (Radogno
II), No. 11-cv-4884, 2011 WL 5868225, at *2 (N.D. Ill.
Nov. 22, 2011), summarily aff’d, 133 S. Ct. 103 (2012).
With no clear standards from this Court by which to
measure partisan gerrymandering claims, lower courts
have been unable to stop the practice, even as they
recognize that it is wrong. Instead, courts across the
country have, with some reluctance, consistently
33
rejected such claims. Given this landscape, citizens
33
See, e.g., Benisek v. Mack, 11 F. Supp. 3d 516, 525 (D. Md. 2014)
(rejecting partisan gerrymandering claim because “the standard
Plaintiffs propose is, in substance, markedly similar to tests that
have already been rejected by the courts”), summarily aff’d, 584
F. App’x 140 (4th Cir. 2014) (per curiam); Perez v. Perry, 26 F.
Supp. 3d 612, 623 (W.D. Tex. 2014) (rejecting partisan
gerrymandering claim after the plaintiffs “contend[ed] that no
standard [was] necessary . . . because Defendants have admitted to
partisan gerrymandering” in addition to proposing tests rejected
in Vieth); Ala. Legislative Black Caucus v. Alabama, 988 F. Supp.
2d 1285, 1296 (M.D. Ala. 2013) (questioning how the court “could
‘allow a claim to go forward that no one understands,’” and for
which plaintiffs “‘don’t even know what evidence [they can]
marshal to either support it or reject it’” (citation omitted); Baldus
v. Members of the Wis. Gov’t Accountability Bd., 849 F. Supp. 2d
20
have understandably looked beyond the courts and
toward other solutions in order to ameliorate the harm
caused by unconstitutional partisan gerrymandering.
840, 853-54 (E.D. Wis. 2012) (rejecting partisan gerrymandering
claim because of the plaintiff’s “failure to offer a workable
standard”); Fletcher v. Lamone, 831 F. Supp. 2d 887, 904 (D. Md.
2011) (concluding that “[a]bsent a clear standard to apply,” it had
no choice but to reject the plaintiffs’ claim), summarily aff’d, 133
S. Ct. 29 (2012); Comm. for a Fair & Balanced Map v. Ill. State
Bd. of Elections, 835 F. Supp. 2d 563, 567, 579 (N.D. Ill. 2011)
(rejecting partisan gerrymandering claim because plaintiff
proposed a standard “not so dissimilar from the effects test
rejected in Vieth”); Radogno II, 2011 WL 5868225, at *2 (rejecting
partisan gerrymandering claim because such claims “are currently
‘unsolvable’ based on the absence of any workable standard for
addressing them”); League of Women Voters v. Quinn, No. 11-cv5569, 2011 WL 5143044, at *1-4 (N.D. Ill. Oct. 28, 2011) (rejecting a
partisan gerrymandering claim based on a First Amendment
standard), summarily aff’d, 132 S. Ct. 2430 (2012); Radogno I,
2011 WL 5025251, at *6 (rejecting partisan gerrymandering claim
because plaintiffs did not state “a workable standard of fairness by
which to assess that claim”); Perez v. Texas, No. 11-CA-0360, 2011
WL 9160142, at *11 (W.D. Tex. Sept. 2, 2011) (rejecting a partisan
gerrymandering claim because the plaintiffs did not “identif[y] a
reliable standard by which to measure the redistricting plan’s
alleged burden on their representational rights”); Henderson v.
Perry, 399 F. Supp. 2d 756, 770 (E.D. Tex. 2005) (rejecting partisan
gerrymandering claim because “the plaintiffs’ contentions . . . are
conspicuous for want of any measure of substantive fairness”);
Pearson v. Koster, 359 S.W.3d 35, 42 (Mo. 2012) (rejecting a
partisan gerrymandering claim “[i]n light of the Supreme Court’s
inability to state a clear standard”); State ex rel. Cooper v.
Tennant, 730 S.E.2d 368, 390 (W. Va. 2012) (rejecting a partisan
gerrymandering claim because of the lack of “any authoritative
standard by which to definitively judge such matters”).
21
B. Partisan Gerrymandering Can Be Curtailed
By Allowing Citizens To Exercise Their
Sovereign Power Over The Redistricting
Process.
When the citizens of Arizona acted to end partisan
gerrymandering in their state, they acted in a manner
fully consistent with our constitutional structure, which
derives its authority from “We the People.” U.S.
Const. pmbl.; see also The Declaration of Independence
para. 2 (U.S. 1776) (“Governments are instituted among
Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the
34
The original constitutional text
governed[.]”).
included numerous structural elements to give effect to
35
the popular will, and of the seventeen amendments
adopted after the Bill of Rights, twelve deal with the
democratic process and the government’s ongoing
36
accountability to the People.
As this Court has
34
John Hart Ely, Democracy and Distrust 87 (1980) (noting that at
its core, the Constitution expresses “overwhelming[] concern[] . . .
with ensuring broad participation in the processes and
distributions of government”).
35
See, e.g., U.S. Const. art. IV, § 4 (guaranteeing states a
republican form of government); art. I, § 2, cl. 3 (providing for
decennial enumeration and establishing minimum population of
House districts); id. art. 1, § 2, cl. 4 (requiring House vacancies to
be filled by elections, not appointments).
36
The Fourteenth Amendment establishes national citizenship,
requires states to provide equal protection of the laws (including
voting districts of equal population), and makes states’
representation in Congress dependent on their granting suffrage
to newly freed slaves. The Fifteenth, Seventeenth, Nineteenth,
Twenty-Third, Twenty-Fourth, and Twenty-Sixth Amendments
22
explained, quoting Alexander Hamilton, “[t]he true
principle of a republic is, that the people should choose
whom they please to govern them.”
Powell v.
McCormack, 395 U.S. 486, 540-41 (1969) (quoting 2
Debates on the Federal Constitution 257 (J. Elliot ed.
1876)). Indeed, “[t]here is no right more basic in our
democracy than the right to participate in electing our
political leaders.” McCutcheon v. FEC, 134 S. Ct. 1434,
1440-41 (2014) (plurality opinion).
It would thus be perverse to interpret the term
“Legislature” in the Elections Clause so as to exclude
lawmaking by the People, particularly where such
lawmaking is intended to secure the constitutional right
guaranteed in Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution
that Members of Congress actually be “chosen . . . by
the People of the several States.” U.S. Const. art. I, §
2. The People of Arizona have exercised their direct
sovereign authority, granted to them by their own
state constitution, to end the practice of partisan
gerrymandering in their state for the election of
members of the House of Representatives. In so doing,
the People of Arizona have specifically sought to
implement equal universal suffrage by banning voting
discrimination on the basis of race, sex, wealth, or youth; providing
for direct popular election of Senators; and permitting residents of
the District of Columbia to participate in presidential elections.
The Twelfth, Twentieth, Twenty-Second, and Twenty-Fifth
amendments provide for separate elections of the President and
Vice-President, limit a lame duck President’s term, impose a twoterm limit on the Presidency, and provide for orderly succession in
times of Presidential disability. The Twenty-Seventh amendment
regulates Congressional self-interest by forbidding Members from
raising their own pay.
23
restore the Framers’ vision of the House as a fluid and
37
“changeable body” by making the specter of frequent
House turnover an actual possibility. The House is, of
course, the governing body that was envisioned by the
38
Framers to be most accountable to the People.
The term “Legislature” in the Elections Clause
should not be read so narrowly that it would forbid the
use of one of a state’s most basic methods of lawmaking:
37
The Federalist No. 63, at 383 (James Madison) (noting that with
its potential to fully turn over every two years, the House was
meant to be a “numerous and changeable body” whose
membership would reflect shifting popular will). In fact, Madison
sought to persuade doubters that two years was not too long a
period for the people to wait to replace their representatives in the
House. See The Federalist No. 52, at 327 (James Madison) (“[I]t is
particularly essential that the [House] should have an immediate
dependence on, and an intimate sympathy with, the people.
Frequent elections are unquestionably the only policy by which
this dependence and sympathy can be effectively secured.”); The
Federalist No. 53, at 330 (James Madison) (“I shall here, perhaps,
be reminded of a current observation, ‘that where annual elections
end, tyranny begins.’”).
The Framers thought that
Representatives must face the prospect of defeat frequently, lest
they forget the source of their authority. See The Federalist No.
57, at 352 (James Madison) (“[T]he House . . . is so constituted as to
support in the members an habitual recollection of their
dependence on the people.”).
38
Of the various governing bodies established by the original
Constitution, the House of Representatives was intended to
remain most closely answerable to the People. See Jay S. Bybee,
Ulysses at the Mast: Democracy, Federalism, and the Sirens’
Song of the Seventeenth Amendment, 91 Nw. U. L. Rev. 500, 51516 (1997) (noting that the House was “the Eighteenth Century
equivalent of government by poll”).
24
lawmaking by vote of the People to remedy
fundamental structural problems with the democratic
system. In engaging in sovereign lawmaking, the
People of Arizona have come up with a fundamentally
democratic solution to the anti-democratic nature of
partisan gerrymandering, which allows self-interested
state legislators to skew unfairly the outcome of
elections and debases the democratic process itself by
“burdening or penalizing citizens because of their
participation in the electoral process, their voting
history, their association with a political party, or their
expression of political views.” Vieth, 541 U.S. at 314
(Kennedy, J., concurring).
Ordinary citizens have a key role to play in
addressing
the
serious
challenge
partisan
gerrymandering poses to our democratic processes.
The Constitution envisions that “[s]erious complex
legal change is often made in the context of a national
conversation involving . . . legislators, judges, and many
39
ordinary citizens whose lives [are affected].” Partisan
gerrymandering warrants, if not demands, such a
broad-based conversation because of its capacity to
distort our democratic ideals. Some state legislators
have attempted various methods of partially
addressing the problem, see Vieth, 541 U.S. at 277 n.4
(plurality opinion) (noting that “[t]he States, of course,
have taken their own steps to prevent abusive
districting practices” by “adopt[ing] standards for
redistricting, and measures designed to insulate the
39
Stephen Breyer, Active Liberty 70-71 (2005).
25
40
process from politics”), and Justices of this Court have
been engaged with this conversation for decades, see
infra Part I.
The Elections Clause should not be used as a sword
to cut ordinary citizens out of this crucial and ongoing
conversation, in which citizens engage in lawmaking so
as to cure structural deficiencies in our system of
government.
Cf. Schuette v. Coal. To Defend
Affirmative Action, 134 S. Ct. 1623, 1650 (2014)
(Breyer, J., concurring) (explaining that “the
‘Constitution creates a democratic political system
through which the people themselves must together
find answers’ to disagreements of this kind” (citation
omitted)); NLRB v. Canning, 134 S. Ct. 2550, 2577
(2014) (noting that the “constitutional structure”
“foresees resolution not only through judicial
interpretation and compromise among the branches but
41
also by the ballot box”).
Indeed, “[t]he essence of democracy is that the right
to make law rests in the people and flows to the
government,
not
the
other
way
around.”
Hollingsworth v. Perry, 133 S. Ct. 2652, 2675 (2013)
(Kennedy, J., dissenting). Thus, when addressing
structural reform of governmental institutions of the
40
See also Brief for Amicus Curiae National Conference of State
Legislatures in Support of Appellant at 3-13.
41
See also Ely, Democracy and Distrust, supra note 32, at 76 (“[I]t
is an appropriate function of the Court to keep the machinery of
democratic government running as it should, to make sure the
channels of political participation and communication are kept
open.”).
26
sort at issue here, lawmaking by the People serves as a
helpful reminder to legislatures that they are dutiful
agents of the People, and to the People themselves of
their ultimate responsibility to ensure that government
is properly functioning on their behalf.
The exercise in popular sovereignty by the voters of
Arizona also fully complies with federal statutory law.
Congress has expressly directed that a state’s
redistricting process be carried out “in the manner
provided by the law thereof.” 2 U.S.C. § 2a(c). In
placing authority for redistricting with the lawmaking
processes of each state rather than with the state
legislature exclusively, Congress exercised its power
under the Elections Clause to direct the manner in
which the election of federal representatives should
42
And
take place, as was envisioned by the Clause.
“there is no compelling reason not to read Elections
Clause legislation simply to mean what it says.”
Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Ariz., Inc., 133 S. Ct.
2247, 2257 (2013); see id. at 2253 (holding that
congressional authority under the Elections Clause
42
Indeed, in 2 U.S.C. § 2a(c), Congress lays out the manner in
which the election of federal representatives should occur in each
State—at large, by districts, or by a combination thereof—and in
so doing, directs that representatives should be elected in a
manner “prescribed by the law of such State.” 2 U.S.C. § 2a(c)(1)(5). This is appropriate because the Elections Clause grants
Congress “a general supervisory power over the whole subject” of
federal elections. Ex parte Siebold, 100 U.S. 371, 387 (1879). By
recognizing that the laws of a state are not the same as the
legislature of the state, Congress has empowered the people of the
state of Arizona to address excessive partisan gerrymandering.
27
should be broadly interpreted).
The Arizona
Constitution empowers the “people” to “propose laws
and amendments to the constitution” by initiative and
referendum. Ariz. Const. art. IV, part 1, § 1. And that
is precisely what they did in this case.
Where, as here, the voters of Arizona have engaged
in lawmaking as authorized under their state
constitution in order to reform the redistricting
process, “direct democracy is playing precisely the role
that it should:
. . . check[ing] dysfunctional
43
It is hard to identify a more
government.”
appropriate “exercise of the[] [people’s] democratic
power” than that of “us[ing] the initiative system to
bypass public officials who were deemed not responsive
to the concerns of a majority of the voters,” Schuette,
134 S. Ct. at 1636, especially as it pertains to their
concerns about the electoral process.
Finally, the exercise of direct democracy reflected
in the creation of Arizona’s independent commission is
an important contribution to a “national dialogue,”
Schuette, 134 S. Ct. at 1630-31, between the people of
the various states, operating as laboratories of
democracy, regarding how best to structure the
redistricting process and end partisan gerrymandering.
See United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549, 581 (1995)
(Kennedy, J., concurring) (“[T]he States may perform
their role as laboratories for experimentation to devise
various solutions where the best solution is far from
43
Note, Judicial Approaches to Direct Democracy, 118 Harv. L.
Rev. 2748, 2764-65 (2005).
28
44
clear.”).
State legislators should not be allowed to
close the laboratory doors to the very people who
elected them, and this Court should not interpret the
Elections Clause in a way that furthers the
undemocratic
practice
of
extreme
partisan
gerrymandering and ends this important conversation.
44
See also Bruce E. Cain, Redistricting Commissions: A Better
Political Buffer?, 121 Yale L.J. 1808, 1812 (2012) (describing the
Arizona and California commissions as “the natural experiments
we can learn the most from because they collectively embody
elements of almost every redistricting reform idea ever
proposed”). Citizens of other states have also contributed to the
conversation. For example, Florida voters passed a constitutional
amendment that prohibited the Florida legislature from favoring
or disfavoring a political party or incumbent when drawing
congressional maps. See Brown v. Sec’y of Fla., 668 F.3d 1271,
1272-73 (11th Cir. 2012) (upholding the amendment and reasoning
that “the Florida voters’ act of lawmaking according to the state’s
expressly enumerated lawmaking process is fully consistent with
the commands of the federal Constitution’s Elections Clause”).
Other states have employed redistricting commissions that vary in
their independence from the legislature. For example, Idaho and
Washington have each tasked politically balanced independent
commissions with final authority to draw congressional districts,
while Hawaii and New Jersey use commissions to draw
congressional districts but allow politicians to serve on those
commissions. Other states use backup commissions to draw
congressional maps if legislators are unable to agree on a
redistricting plan by a certain date, and still others utilize advisory
commissions to assist legislators with the redistricting process.
See Justin Levitt, Who Draws The Lines?, All About
Redistricting,
Loyola
Law
School,
http://redistricting.lls.edu/who.php (last visited Jan. 11, 2015).
29
CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the
District Court for the District of Arizona should be
affirmed.
Respectfully submitted,
J. GERALD HEBERT
THE CAMPAIGN LEGAL
CENTER, INC.
215 E Street, NE
Washington, DC 20002
SEAN J. YOUNG
STEVEN R. SHAPIRO
MATTHEW COLES
DALE E. HO
JULIE EBENSTEIN
AMERICAN CIVIL
LIBERTIES UNION
FOUNDATION
125 Broad Street
New York, NY 10004
PAUL M. SMITH
Counsel of Record
JESSICA RING AMUNSON
MICHELLE R. SINGER
JENNER & BLOCK LLP
1099 New York Ave., NW
Suite 900
Washington, DC 20001
(202) 639-6000
psmith@jenner.com
LLOYD LEONARD
THE LEAGUE OF WOMEN
VOTERS OF THE UNITED
STATES
1730 M Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036
ARTHUR N. EISENBERG
NEW YORK CIVIL
LIBERTIES UNION
125 Broad Street
New York, NY 10004
Counsel for Amici Curiae
January 23, 2015